“ULI members in San Antonio understand the precariousness of their city’s housing crisis,” says Javier Paredes, principal at StudioMassivo and ULI San Antonio member leader. “They [also] recognize the power of aligning housing with transit to create greater housing stability.” In response to San Antonio’s housing crisis, ULI San Antonio members and staff applied to participate in a local technical assistance grant program from ULI’s Homeless to Housed (H2H) initiative.
ULI San Antonio embarked on its Homeless to Housed journey with the intention of enhancing education on a range of housing types. Diversifying housing typologies can broaden San Antonio’s housing market, expanding homeownership and rental opportunities to include smaller and more cost-effective options. Increasing the housing supply and reducing development costs are critical steps for addressing the housing affordability issues that often contribute to higher rates of homelessness according to Homelessness is a Housing Problem.
The timing of this important housing conversation aligned with a USDOT Thriving Communities Program grant award to San Antonio’s VIA Metropolitan Transit to provide technical assistance and support the related robust community engagement needed to ensure that the under-resourced communities linked by the future transit line are a part of the transit conversation. When combined, these partners and their respective resources launched an important movement across San Antonio, amplifying the benefits of co-locating affordable housing and public transit.
Homelessness in San Antonio is a community-wide challenge, with 3,155 people living unhoused in the city according to 2023 point-in-time calculations. Housing every San Antonian will require additional emergency shelters and more transitional housing––and it must also include additional affordable and attainable housing units, which, according to ULI’s 2019 Attainable Housing report, are typically nonsubsidized units that are affordable to households with incomes between 80 and 120 percent of the area median income.
In a city marked by the prevalence of single-family homes, new housing policies in San Antonio are making room for residential building configurations that are denser and more flexible. Multifamily construction is on the rise in San Antonio, as is the construction of accessory dwelling units—now made possible through a new city ordinance. At the same time, residents generally remain wary of proximate density and of homes that do not fit the traditional single-family format.
Knowing that single-family homeownership can be difficult to achieve for a significant segment of the population, ULI San Antonio and Local Initiatives Support Corporation–San Antonio (LISC) partnered to create a survey tool that would raise the visibility of diverse housing typologies—duplexes, triplexes, cottage courts, and townhomes—and lay the foundation for more prevalent development of these housing types across the market. The process was also designed to increase community familiarity with and acceptance of buildings of greater density, which could facilitate the expansion of housing opportunities for more San Antonians.
As a city, San Antonio already has a strong local partnership that connects housing needs and transit. This grant brings the resources needed to develop a mobile two-way engagement tool that can expand local understanding of housing options.”
Concurrently, USDOT’s recent Thriving Communities Program award to San Antonio’s VIA Metropolitan Transit opened the doors to exciting progress for the city’s growing transit initiatives, namely the proposed east-west Advanced Rapid Transit Silver Line corridor. The Thriving Communities award brings technical assistance, planning, and capacity-building support to VIA, the City of San Antonio, Bexar County, and LISC over the next two years. It supports VIA’s public engagement work, helping to ensure robust community participation.
ULI San Antonio, VIA, and LISC leveraged the ULI Homeless to Housed (H2H) grant funding to elevate the housing typology survey work and focus the efforts on the communities surrounding the proposed Silver Line corridor. While San Antonio has had transit-oriented development (TOD) regulations in place for years, the lack of robust citywide transit has limited TOD growth, leaving the public with little familiarity with or understanding of how housing, transit, and development can align to create more attainable and economically sustainable communities.
Working in partnership with the local Thriving Communities team, ULI San Antonio designed a housing typology survey using Hello Lamp Post to encourage community exploration of the potential housing typology opportunities along transit. The survey also helped inform San Antonians about the benefits of the infrastructure investments underway across the city.
The Hello Lamp Post survey, distributed through a QR code on VIA buses and at community events, raised the visibility of diverse housing types, and responding community members identified features they value in their neighborhoods. Many respondents prioritized living near grocery stores, parks, and schools. Walkability and public transportation were also highly valued, with frequent mentions of access to bus stops, sidewalks, and transit routes. Affordability played a significant role in responses, with many noting a desire for reasonably priced housing, including low-income or rent-controlled options. Preferences for housing types varied, with respondents generally favoring single-family homes, apartments, and townhouses. Community members also expressed an interest in housing that fostered a sense of community and mixed-use opportunities where living spaces are combined with local businesses.
Overall, the survey responses underlined a blend of practical necessities, such as affordability and accessibility, with personal preferences for community, safety, and proximity to daily amenities. The survey results, when shared with policymakers and developers, will help inform regulatory actions and development decisions based on community wants and needs. The results place further emphasis on the importance of housing affordability and transportation accessibility, particularly in areas where these basic expenses can tip households beyond their financial capacity and lead to homelessness.
ULI’s community engagement around the rapid transit lines sparked several other initiatives that will support the housing and transportation needs of San Antonians. The proposed expansion of the transit line into the Buena Vista community led Former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros to ask ULI to assist with expanding housing and transit conversations in this west side neighborhood. Using the early results from the housing typology survey, the San Antonio Housing Trust is expanding its focus to include the types of infill and smaller-scale developments highlighted in the survey, moving beyond its early focus on large-scale projects. Finally, the H2H conversations also brought to light the need for additional housing for the city’s at-risk youth, and community and civic partners are now convening to discuss solutions funded by a second Homeless to Housed local technical assistance grant. This work is creating systems-level change for the city and its transit services and is providing meaningful community engagement around critical housing needs.
Working with ULI and its partners, the City of San Antonio is actively removing barriers to additional affordable housing development and is land banking parcels now for future housing initiatives. ULI continues to serve as an important information conduit, highlighting progress in housing development and sharing information about the development opportunities available through additional infill housing. The work also provides critical support to the city’s affordable housing narrative, presenting these projects in a way that can be understood and accepted rather than rejected out of hand by NIMBY-minded residents.
Systemic change takes time. Through this expansion of housing opportunities to reduce the risk of homelessness and the alignment of housing and transportation, San Antonio residents—today’s residents and future generations—can benefit from the expanded housing choices and housing security that transit infrastructure investments can bring.
Editor’s note: ULI San Antonio, along with four other district councils (ULI Louisiana, ULI Philadelphia, ULI San Diego-Tijuana, and ULI San Francisco), received a Homeless to Housed (H2H) local technical assistance grant to explore real estate-driven solutions to homelessness. As a part of ULI’s Terwilliger Center for Housing, H2H works to catalyze the production and preservation of deeply affordable supportive housing to end the U.S. homelessness crisis. The work is made possible with the generous support of Carolyn and Preston Butcher and a growing number of ULI members.
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